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    <TITLE>Where is NetCDF Used?</TITLE>
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    <META NAME="DESCRIPTION" CONTENT="The netcdfgroup@unidata.ucar.edu mailing list has over 500 addresses in 32 countries. Several groups have adopted netCDF as a standard way to represent some forms of scientific data.">
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    <A NAME="netcdf" ID="netcdf"></A>
    <h1>Where is NetCDF Used?</h1>
    <p>
      Making the software available freely available without registration
      makes it difficult
      to know where and how netCDF is being used, but we have compiled a
      <a
      href="https://www.unidata.ucar.edu/committees/usercom/2013Apr/statusreports/metrics/downloads/session/netcdf/known_sites_list_per_year.html"
      >list</a> of over 1300 educational, research, and government sites that have
      recently made some use of netCDF, based on
      <ol>
        <li>
          downloads from the Unidata downloads site
        </li>
        <li>
          subscribers and posters to netCDF mailing lists
        </li>
        <li>
          email support requests
        </li>
        <li>
          participation in annual netCDF workshops
        </li>
      </ol>
      during the period from 2012-04-01 through 2013-04-01.
    </p>
    <p>
      Recent standardization efforts have resulted in <a href="docs/standards.html" >netCDF endorsements</a> by
      several standards bodies.
    </p>
    <p>
      Here is a partial list
      of organizations using netCDF for archiving and
      accessing some of their data:
    </p>
    <ul>
      <li>
        NOAA:
        <ul>
          <li>
            GFDL
          </li>
          <li>
            NOAA NODC (National Oceanographic Data Center)
          </li>
          <li>
            NCEP NOMADS service
          </li>
          <li>
            PMEL
          </li>
          <li>
            FSL
          </li>
          <li>
            NCDC NOMADS service
          </li>
          <li>
            NDBC (National Buoy Data Center)
          </li>
          <li>
            NOS/COOPS
          </li>
          <li>
            NMFS/PFEL
          </li>
          <li>
            ESRL (formerly CDC)
          </li>
        </ul>
      </li>
      <li>
        EUMETSAT Data Centre
      </li>
      <li>
        GOES-R Ground Segment Products
      </li>
      <li>
        DOE/PCMDI CMIP5 climate model outputs
      </li>
      <li>
        NASA/JPL
      </li>
      <li>
        NASA/GSFC
      </li>
      <li>
        GHRSST-PP community
      </li>
      <li>
        US Navy/ Fleet Numerical/GODAE Data Server
      </li>
      <li>
        OceanSITES.org
      </li>
      <li>
        National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC)
      </li>
      <li>
        USGS, Woods Hole Field Center (WHFC)
      </li>
      <li>
        National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
      </li>
      <li>
        Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies (COLA)
      </li>
      <li>
        George Mason University (GMU) Center for Earth Observing and Space Research
      </li>
      <li>
        Asia-Pacific Data-Research Center (APDRC)
      </li>
      <li>
        (Australia) CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research (CMAR) Remote Sensing
      </li>
      <li>
        (Australia) Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research (CAWCR)
      </li>
      <li>
        (France) AVISO (satellite data)
      </li>
      <li>
        (France) French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea (IFREMER)
      </li>
      <li>
        (Germany) Federal Waterways Engineering and Research Institute (BAW)
      </li>
      <li>
      	(Germany) German Aerospace Agency (DLR)
      </li>
      <li>
        (Italy) International Centre for Theoretical Physics (ICTP)
      </li>
      <li>
        (South Korea) Seoul National University (SNU)
      </li>
      <li>
        (Netherlands) European Climate Assessment (ECA), Atmospheric
        Data Access for the Geospatial User Community (ADAGUC) product standard
      </li>
      <li>
        (Netherlands) Cabauw Experimental Site for Atmospheric Research (CESAR)
      </li>
    </ul>
    <p>
      We list below brief descriptions of some of the projects
      and groups that have reported on their use of netCDF.
    </p>

    <p></p>
    <hr />
    <ul>
      <li>
        Several commercial analysis and data visualization packages have been adapted
        to access netCDF data. For more information about these and about freely-available
        software packages that can be used to display, analyze, and manipulate netCDF
        data, see the <a
        href="/software/netcdf/software.html">https://www.unidata.ucar.edu/software/netcdf/software.html</a>
        document.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        NOAA&#39;s <a href="http://www.cdc.noaa.gov">Climate Analysis
        Branch (CAB)</a>, conducts diagnostic studies of climate variability
        on time scales of months to centuries. CAB climatological data is
        archived in netCDF format.
        This site gives access to metadata (information about these datasets) which
        can be searched by various keywords; actual data can be subset or plotted
        on-line and can be downloaded via ftp.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        Modeling groups contributing output to the Intergovernmental
        Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
        model archives at the Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and
        Intercomparison (PCMDI) are <a href="http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/IPCC_output_requirements.htm" >required</a> to provide files in netCDF
        conforming with the NetCDF Climate and Forecast (CF) Metadata
        Conventions.
        <p></p>
      </li>

      <li>
        EUMETSAT has begun to offer netCDF as a common delivery format
        for <a
        href="http://www.eumetsat.int/Home/Main/DataAccess/EUMETSATDataCentre/SP_20111027152034196?l=en)"
        >popular datasets</a> ordered from their archive.  The developed
        datasets use netCDF-4 classic model format.
        <p></p>
      </li>

      <li>
        NASA&#39;s Halogen Occultation Experiment ( <a
        href="http://haloedata.larc.nasa.gov/">HALOE</a>) makes HALOE data available in
        netCDF form. The <a
        href="http://haloedata.larc.nasa.gov/haloe_data_2.html">HALOE Data Viewer</a>
        provides each data type with a menu driven interface to assist in locating
        files based on date, time, species, data version and mode.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The global ocean modeling effort at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL),
        as part of the DOE <a
        href="http://www.esd.ornl.gov/programs/chammp/chammp.html">CHAMMP</a> effort and
        one of the DOE Grand Challenges, has selected netCDF as the archival format
        for its computational data. An effort to bring netCDF up on the parallel disks
        on the CM-5 is planned to begin shortly.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The National Center for Supercomputing Applications has incorporated the
        netCDF 2.3 interfaces into the latest release of their <a href="http://hdf.ncsa.uiuc.edu/">HDF</a>
        software, permitting HDF tools that use this interface to be applied to netCDF
        datasets that are either XDR- or HDF-encoded.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Computer Planning Committee of NOAA&#39;s Pacific Marine Environmental
        Laboratory (PMEL) endorsed netCDF as the preferred data format for the Laboratory
        in early 1993. PMEL has developed two freely-distributed applications that
        utilize NetCDF -- the EPIC system (for observational data) and Ferret (gridded
        data).
        <p>
          <a href="http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/epic">EPIC</a> is a system for management,
          display and analysis of oceanographic time series and hydrographic data.
          EPIC toolkits for netCDF include a data file I/O library, which is layered
          on top of the netCDF library, a netCDF calculator (nccalc) linked with a
          scientific graphics package (PPLUS), a suite of display and analysis programs
          for oceanographic data, and a <a
          href="http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/epic/mexeps.html">MATLAB interface</a> to netCDF.
        </p>
        <p>
          <a href="http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/ferret/home.html">Ferret</a> is a visualization
          and analysis program, also built upon the PPLUS program, that permits users
          to explore large and complex gridded data sets. New variables may be defined
          interactively as mathematical transformations. Complex analyses proceed
          as hierarchical variable definitions. Visit <a
          href="http://ferret.wrc.noaa.gov/fbin/climate_server">Live Access to Climate Data</a>
          for a better sense of the Ferret program.
        </p>
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <a href="http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/">Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory</a>
        of Columbia University has converted all Marine Geophysics data (gravity,
        magnetics and bathymetry) acquired in the past 40 years by scientists at L-DEO
        as well as at other institutions to netCDF. The <a
        href="http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~mggdb/">Marine Geology &amp; Geophysics Database</a>
        is a fundamental resource for Lamont scientists and students.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The <a href="http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/gmt">Generic Mapping Tools (GMT)</a>,
        a set of command-line tools for data manipulation and display using PostScript,
        make use of netCDF for storage of 2-D gridded data sets. GMT is used worldwide
        by about 6000 scientists, according to the developers.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <a href="http://www.epa.gov/asmdnerl/mod3.html">The Models-3 Project</a>,
        being cooperatively pursued by the EPA&#39;s Atmospheric Research Laboratory
        and by North Carolina Supercomputing Center, is using an environmental-modeling-specific
        applications programming interface on top of UCAR&#39;s netCDF as the means
        for persistent storage of both observational and model-output data, as well
        as for storing sets of data-file-structure definitions and (prototype, so
        far) data-dependency graphs for scheduling the sets of programs which constitute
        their environmental models.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        A group in the Atmospheric Chemistry Division at NCAR (the National Center
        for Atmospheric Research) that deals with UARS (Upper Atmospheric Research
        Satellite) data uses netCDF for their binary data format. Output from NCAR&#39;s
        High Altitude Observatory Division Thermospheric General Circulation Model
        (TGCM) and related models are converted to netCDF files for post-model visualization
        and diagnostic codes. NCAR&#39;s Research Aviation Facility has decided to
        use netCDF to distribute aircraft data.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        NCAR&#39;s Research Data Program uses netCDF as the primary file format
        for data archived and used in the <a
        href="http://www.atd.ucar.edu/rdp/zebra.html">Zebra</a> display and analysis system.
        Quick look data from various projects is distributed by RDP in netCDF. NetCDF
        is also the file format used by the (Zebra-based) Integrated Sounding System.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Cooperative Program for Operation Meteorology, Education, and Training
        (COMET), a program of UCAR, has created an extensive archive of meteorological
        case studies that contain observed and gridded data in netCDF. The netCDF
        definition in use was created by the Forecast Systems Laboratory (FSL), a
        NOAA agency, and files in this format are required for capatability with their
        PC-DARE workstations which are used in the COMET teaching classroom. COMET
        plans to create future case studies using the netCDF conventions currently
        being developed by a working group of Unidata, COMET, and FSL personnel.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <p>
          Climate data are archived at several of the NOAA Regional Climate Centers
          (RCCs) usuig netCDF files. The netCDF software provides rapid access to
          time-series data and is at the core of a newly developed distributed data
          access system that will be employed at all of the NOAA RCCs and will be
          linked to the NOAA Virtual Data System (NVDS).
        </p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Earth Scan Lab, an HRPT ground station at Coastal Studies Institute,
        is using both the Terascan TDF as well as the netCDF for ease of data exhange
        of AVHRR, TOVS and DCS data. Further, in conjunction with Woods Hole, Scripps
        and Texas A&amp;M, CSI will be maintaining all oceanographic data in netCDF.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        DataHub from JPL, with funding from AISRP/NASA identifies and converts between
        a variety of data format, CDF, HDF, MMM/netCDF, FITS, PDS, ... Work is under
        way to support conversion from a variety of NASA data formats to netCDF used
        by the PolyPaint+ visualization system from NCAR&#39;s MMM division. (JPL
        Contact for DataHub: Tom Handley, thandley@spacemouse.jpl.nasa.gov)
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        A major component of the US Climate and Global Change program is the TOGA-TAO
        Array in the tropical Pacific, which proposes to maintain approximately 70
        moored ATLAS wind and thermistor chain and current meter buoys, spanning the
        Pacific ocean from 95W to 137E in the equatorial wave guide. The TAO Project
        Office, at PMEL, has developed distribution and display software for the real-time
        data from the TAO buoys, in a point-and-click UNIX workstation environment.
        This software is distributed nationally and internationally. All data is stored
        and distributed in netCDF format. All graphics displays and animations are
        produced with the EPIC tools for working with netCDF data files.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Woods Hole Field Center of the U.S.G.S. Marine and Coastal Geology Program
        uses netCDF to access a variety of scientific data sets, including output
        from circulation and sediment transport models, sonar imagery, digital elevation
        models, and environmental sensor data. They also make available the <a
        href="http://crusty.er.usgs.gov/~cdenham/MexCDF/nc4ml5.html">NetCDF Toolbox for
        Matlab-5</a>
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        At the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, netCDF is used in several areas.
        Ships in the UNOLS fleet are recording measurements from the IMET systems
        in netCDF form. These data include wind, barometer, humidity, air and sea
        temperature, precipitation, short wave radiation, and GPS navigation. Data
        sets from these systems taken during the WOCE experiments in the Pacific have
        been archived recently at NCAR. Also, measurements from a diverse set of instruments
        deployed on buoys for the Subduction, TOGA/COARE, and several other experiments
        are translated into netCDF form for processing and archival. Reports that
        describe the software systems used for these processing activities are available
        from WHOI.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) and the University Corporation
        for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) conducted a multi-platform climate field project
        during March of 1994 based in Nadi, Fiji. All data from this experiment will
        be archived using Unidata&#39;s netCDF before release to the scientific community.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Oregon State University Oceanographic <a
        href="http://lubber.oce.orst.edu/Wecoma/WecomaHome.html">Research Vessel WECOMA</a>
        uses the netCDF library for primary scientific data logging. This includes
        navigational, meteorological, and other miscellaneous data. This logging is
        part of a client/server system for data distribution, display, and management
        known as XMIDAS.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        NOAA&#39;s <a href="http://www.fsl.noaa.gov/">Forecast System Laboratory</a>
        has adopted netCDF as a data access interface for some of their systems and
        applications.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The <a href="http://www.its.csiro.au/">CSIRO</a> Division of Atmospheric
        Research in Australia uses netCDF to store all their GCM and ocean model results.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Cabauw Experimental Site for Atmospheric Research (<a
        href="http://www.cesar-database.nl/" >Cesar</a>) is
        a consortium of presently eight institutes and universities located
        in the Netherlands. The goal of the consortium is to operate and
        maintain at the Cabauw site a unique observational facility with a
        comprehensive set of remote sensing and in-situ equipment to
        characterize the state of the atmosphere, its radiative properties
        and the interaction with the land surface.  All the data are stored
        in netCDF formatted files and comply with the CF-1.4 convention.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        Meteorological data from satellites is stored in netCDF form at CIRES (Cooperative
        Institute for Research in the Environmental Sciences) and several data analysis
        packages have been written to display and analyze the netCDF data.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        A general purpose finite element data model (referred to as EXODUS II) utilizing
        netCDF has been developed at Sandia National Laboratories. It consists of
        a C and FORTRAN application programming interface (API) to read and write
        geometry and results (including time varying data) for finite element analyses.
        For more information, contact Larry Schoof (laschoo@somnet.sandia.gov).
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        <a href="http://www.aero.polimi.it/~mbdyn/" >MBDyn</a> is an
        open-source Multi-body dynamics analysis system that
        uses netCDF as its output format.  MBDyn features the integrated
        multidisciplinary analysis of multibody, multiphysics systems,
        including nonlinear mechanics of rigid and flexible constrained
        bodies, smart materials, electric networks, active control,
        hydraulic networks, essential fixed-wing and rotorcraft
        aerodynamics.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        NetCDF is the vehicle adopted by the Analytical Instrument Association [AIA]
        to implement the Analytical Data Interchange Protocols [Andi Protocols] for
        chromatography [released in 1992] and mass spectrometry [released in 1994].
        The Andi
        Protocols increase laboratory efficiency and productivity
        by facilitating the integration and use of data from multiple vendors&#39;
        products. For more information about the Andi chromatography protocols, see
        the article <a
        href="http://pubs.acs.org/hotartcl/tcaw/98/may/stan.html">&quot;Standards for
        Chromatography Data Systems: ASTM adopts protocols for analytical data interchange
        (Andi)&quot;</a> from May 1998 issue of the American Chemical Society publication <i>Today&#39;s Chemist at Work</i> The resulting standard specifications and
        guides may be downloaded from <a
        href="http://www.astm.org/">ASTM</a>:

        <ul>
          <li>
            <a
            href="http://www.astm.org/cgi-bin/SoftCart.exe/DATABASE.CART/PAGES/E1947.htm?L+mystore+rpwd2606"> E1947-98 Standard Specification for Analytical Data Interchange Protocol for
            Chromatographic Data</a>
          </li>
          <li>
            <a
            href="http://www.astm.org/cgi-bin/SoftCart.exe/DATABASE.CART/PAGES/E1948.htm?L+mystore+rpwd2606"> E1948-98 Standard Guide for Analytical Data Interchange Protocol for Chromatographic
            Data</a>
          </li>
          <li>
            <a
            href="http://www.astm.org/cgi-bin/SoftCart.exe/DATABASE.CART/REDLINE_PAGES/E2077.htm?L+mystore+uvlt1856" > E2077-00 Standard Specification for Analytical Data Interchange
            Protocol for Mass Spectrometric Data</a>
          </li>
        </ul>
        Further development related to these standards now seems to be under the purview of
        an ASTM subcommittee E13.15 on analytical Data Management, at the
        Source Forge site <a href="http://andi.sourceforge.net/"
        >http://andi.sourceforge.net/</a>. <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        The Positron Imaging Laboratories and the Neuro-Imaging Laboratory of the
        Montreal Neurological Institute have selected netCDF as the data format for
        their medical image files. Conventions for variable and attribute names and
        values have been established for the medical imaging context. These conventions,
        along with a package of routines to assist in handling image data, make up
        the MINC (Medical Image NetCDF) format. For more information, contact Peter
        Neelin (neelin@pet.mni.mcgill.ca) or see <a href="http://www.bic.mni.mcgill.ca/software/minc/" > http://www.bic.mni.mcgill.ca/software/minc/</a>. <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        In the field of molecular dynamics and the simulation of
        biomolecules, <a
        href="http://amber.scripps.edu/formats.html#netcdf" >netCDF
        conventions</a> are now used
        for storing and accessing trajectory files associated
        with the <a href="http://amber.scripps.edu/index.html" >AMBER
        project</a>. <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        In computational biology, specifically flow cytometry, netCDF/HDF5
        format has been used in new OpenCyto software. See
        Finak G, Frelinger J, Jiang W, Newell EW, Ramey J, et al. (2014) OpenCyto: An Open Source Infrastructure for Scalable, Robust, Reproducible, and
        Automated, End-to-End Flow Cytometry Data Analysis. PLoS Comput Biol 10(8): e1003806. doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003806.
        <p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
        At the Federal Waterways Engineering and Research Institute (<a href="http://www.baw.de/EN/Home/home_node.html">BAW</a>),
        netCDF is used in several ways. In combination with the <a href="https://github.com/ugrid-conventions/ugrid-conventions">UGRID conventions</a>
        computational results from different hydrodynamic numerical models are stored for unstructured grids,
        e.g. water level, current velocity, and salinity. NetCDF is also used to store derived quantities
        like tidal high and low water, tidal range and many other similar characteristic numbers. In addition,
        measured data (tide gauge data, ADCP) are also stored in netCDF files based on NOAA's
        <a href="http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/data/formats/netcdf/v1.1/">NODC NetCDF templates</a>.<p></p>
      </li>
      <li>
      <a href="http://www.dlr.de/">The German Aerospace Agency (DLR)</a>, located in Munich, are using netcdf-4 / CF
	  standards for the provision of L2 data for S5p mission including L2
	  products such as Sulfur Dioxide, Ozone, Formaldehyde and Clouds
	  (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentinel-5_Precursor">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentinel-5_Precursor</a> or
	  <a href="https://sentinel.esa.int/web/sentinel/missions/sentinel-5p">https://sentinel.esa.int/web/sentinel/missions/sentinel-5p</a>).
      </li>     
    </ul>
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